The Brief

It’s been 10 years since California decided to let low-income undocumented immigrants qualify for state subsidies of phone and internet services.

Today the California LifeLine program — which helps 1.2 million low income households get free or discounted services — still excludes hundreds of thousands of undocumented residents because they don’t have Social Security numbers.

Advocates say a decade is far too long for immigrants without legal status to be denied a crucial service. Cell phones have become vital for people to access social programs and health care, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Honestly, how much longer do folks have to wait?” asked Ashley Salas, an attorney with the consumer group, The Utility Reform Network (TURN). “How much longer are folks going to be harmed?”

The California Public Utilities Commission said Thursday it has implemented its 2014 decision to stop using Social Security numbers to determine if someone is eligible for the LifeLine program. The commission said it does not use Social Security numbers to verify applicants’ identity.

But the LifeLine application still asks for Social Security numbers, shutting people out of the program who don’t have the numbers, advocates said recently.

In December the commission asked consumer advocates and service providers to provide suggestions about how to make the changes the commission decided on 10 years ago. Some service providers responded with their own questions and with skepticism.

A ‘lifeline’ for undocumented immigrants

Natchelly Ruvalcava, a 51-year-old mother of one, said she could have used LifeLine’s discounts on cell phone service. The Los Angeles resident said she lost her livelihood when she got out of an abusive relationship but was stuck with more than $1,000 in unpaid cell charges she can’t afford.

She has since switched to a $25-a-month plan and uses an old phone with a dying battery.

“I use it a lot,” she said, “to connect with my attorney and people from (Neighborhood Legal Services), my church, with my son.”

Ruvalcava, who is undocumented, said she would sign up for LifeLine and lose the monthly bills, if she could. “Twenty-five dollars saved a month is really helpful to buy things for my son.”

The state’s LifeLine program reimburses phone and internet service providers $19 a month per low-income customer they sign up for free or low-cost cell or internet service.

To qualify a customer must earn less than 150% of the federal poverty line, which for a four-person household is about $45,900 a year. Most recipients of other social services, such as CalFresh or Medi-Cal, would qualify for LifeLine.

Many also usually qualify for the federal Lifeline program, but that program requires recipients to have Social Security numbers and reimburses providers $9.25 a month per customer.

Advocates said at least 700,000 undocumented Californians would benefit from removing the Social Security requirement from the LifeLine application. They based the estimate on how many undocumented Californians became eligible for Medi-Cal through recent expansions of those services.

The Social Security barrier

Over the years California has expanded its welfare programs to undocumented residents, including CalFresh and Medi-Cal.

Even the federal government allows undocumented immigrants to qualify for its pandemic-era Affordable Connectivity Program, which subsidizes broadband access for low income residents. That program doesn’t require a Social Security number.

In 2014 the state’s public utilities commission directed staff to begin the process of expanding LifeLine to consumers lacking Social Security numbers. The following year the commission requested a waiver from federal regulators to allow those people to apply to the federal program. So far, there has been no waiver.

The California Public Utilities Commission said it has stopped using Social Security numbers as a “gating factor” in determining the identity of an applicant. The agency didn’t say when it made that change.

Last year, multiple “stakeholders” informed the agency that just having the option to enter a Social Security number on LifeLine applications was a barrier for some applicants, said Terrie Prosper, a spokesperson for the commission. That’s when the agency started asking for feedback.

“The California LifeLine program is constantly evolving,” Prosper said. “Moreover, the program must adapt to evolving technology and a dynamic market while simultaneously balancing the needs of low-income qualified consumers and the challenges of managing multiple wireless service providers who participate voluntarily.”

Advocates say they were not aware of any changes the utilities commission made to their application process, and regardless of the changes, residents without legal status haven’t been able to access the program.

“It’s not making a meaningful difference for folks to be able to access the program,” Salas said.

The impact of years of delay

Julie Rattray, an attorney for Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County, said she discovered the state’s 10-year delay last year, when a client who already had Medi-Cal tried signing up for LifeLine. The client was turned down.

Rattray said a staff person in the commission’s communications division told her the 2014 decision had not been implemented.

“We never imagined that one year later … the CPUC would still have failed to take action, but here we are,” she said.

Rattray said California’s LifeLine has fallen behind the trend of other state programs.

“If people are missing their medical appointments, if they miss their benefit renewals, if they can’t make an appointment with social service providers, you’re going to see significant impacts on households and their health,” she said.

That has already happened. A study last year found inadequate cell phone devices or service were major deterrents for elderly, non-English speaking patients seeking telehealth care during the pandemic, said Arturo Vargas Bustamante, professor at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.

The public utilities commission said cost isn’t an issue. The state LifeLine program is funded by a monthly surcharge on existing telephone service. The program’s budget for fiscal year 2022-23 was $274.4 million, according to the agency.

Many undocumented immigrants already are paying into the program via the surcharge, though many can’t benefit from it, said Vinhcent Le, technology equity legal counsel for the Greenlining Institute, which promotes equity for communities of color.

Seeking ‘safe harbor’

The California utilities commission in December asked providers and advocates some questions about the proposed change: Instead of Social Security numbers, what other forms of identity verification should the state use? And should California subsidize the federal discounts Californians won’t receive because they lack Social Security numbers?

AT&T wrote in its response that it doesn’t have a position on what the commission should substitute for Social Security numbers, but the state should make up for losing federal support for LifeLine participants if the change moves forward.

TracFone Wireless, a Verizon subsidiary, said the changes would impose a burden because supplemental ID documents would have to be manually reviewed. The company also suggested the state commission should create a “safe harbor” provision to protect providers from claims and administrative penalties for accepting LifeLine participants without Social Security numbers.

“Without such a safe harbor, TracFone believes that many providers will be reluctant to develop enrollment system changes and marketing that permit the no SSN enrollment exception,” the company wrote.

Several phone service providers said that without Social Security numbers, verifying identities to avoid fraud or duplicate accounts would be more difficult.

Sala said such concerns are an excuse to create barriers for low income customers.

Fraud does happen, she said, but often it’s from “street teams” under pop up tents, fabricating applications for service using fake names — rather than from real customers applying for LifeLine.

Andy Pages drove in two runs with a bases-loaded single in the seventh inning to give Los Angeles the lead, and the Dodgers beat the Atlanta Braves 4-1 on Wednesday night to clinch their NL Division Series.

The Dodgers won back-to-back games in Atlanta to take the best-of-five matchup 3-1 and advance to the National League Championship Series as they seek to become the first NL team to win three straight World Series.

Pages lined a 3-2 pitch from Robert Suarez up the middle to drive in Teoscar Hernández, who singled off starter Tyler Mahle, and pinch-runner Tommy Edman for a 3-1 lead. Didier Fuentes walked pinch-hitter Josue De Paula and Kyle Tucker to load the bases. Edman ran for De Paula.

Max Muncy’s solo shot off Raisel Iglesias in the ninth padded the lead and gave the slugger 19 postseason homers with the Dodgers, extending his franchise record.

Dodgers right-hander Tyler Glasnow, making his first start since Sept. 24, allowed only one hit but walked five batters in 4 2/3 innings. After he issued two walks in the fifth, left-hander Alex Vesia ended the inning on Matt Olson’s groundout to second base.

The missed opportunity left the Braves with 18 walks in the series, and none scored.

Glasnow and four relievers combined to give up just three hits. Tanner Scott pitched a perfect eighth before Edwin Díaz got three quick outs for the save.

Mahle, a native of Newport Beach, California, who grew up a Dodgers fan, allowed two runs — one earned — in 6 1/3 innings.

Michael Harris II hit Glasnow’s first pitch for a single before stealing second and eventually scoring from third on a wild pitch that bounced off catcher Will Smith’s chest protector.

The Dodgers pulled even in the second with the help of two Atlanta errors. Shohei Ohtani walked, stole second and advanced to third on catcher Sean Murphy’s errant throw into center field. Muncy’s pop fly into shallow left field was dropped by shortstop Mauricio Dubón for another error, allowing Ohtani to score.

Hernández crashed into the wall while attempting to catch Ozzie Albies’ double off Vesia leading off the sixth. Hernández pointed to his head and neck when talking to an athletic trainer but remained in the game.

Edgardo Henriquez stranded Albies at second. Henriquez allowed one hit in 1 2/3 scoreless innings for the win.

Injury report

Dodgers second baseman Miguel Rojas was held out after leaving Tuesday night’s 3-1 win during an at-bat in the eighth inning with lower back soreness. Los Angeles manager Dave Roberts said Rojas would not be available off the bench.

Ronald Acuña Jr. started in right field for Atlanta one day after being moved to designated hitter in a late lineup change due to right knee soreness.

Up next

The Dodgers will face Milwaukee or San Diego in Game 1 of the NLCS on Sunday.

The Democratic National Committee on Wednesday sued President Donald Trump’s administration for recent television advertisements that promoted his political message while costing taxpayers millions of dollars.

The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, alleges that the ads are illegal government-sponsored propaganda and accuses Trump of personally directing them. It asks the court to declare the ads illegal and stop the use of federal funds to pay for them.

Trump has faced bipartisan backlash for the ads, which glorify him and echo his campaign pitch as voters cast early ballots with the midterm elections less than a month away.

The spots, which began airing in September, already have cost more than $12 million to run, according to the media tracking firm AdImpact, and a total of $20 million in Homeland Security Department funding has been tapped to pay for them.

Responding Monday to the criticism, Trump defended the ads as “positive promotion for our Great U.S.A.” but said he’d pay for them using his MAGA Inc. super PAC going forward.

But on Tuesday, the fifth ad in the campaign began airing with the notice “paid for by the U.S. Government,” promoting Trump’s military actions in Venezuela earlier this year. The same day, Trump made it clear he hasn’t committed to reimbursing any money that has already been spent, telling reporters “we’ll decide.”

DNC Chair Ken Martin said in a statement that Trump is misusing taxpayer dollars in “a last-ditch attempt to save Republicans in November.”

“Americans deserve better than to have their hard-earned tax dollars used for Trump’s illegal schemes,” he added.

Legal experts have suggested the ads run afoul of a federal statute against congressionally appropriated money being used for “publicity or propaganda,” and potentially other federal laws. The Homeland Security money tapped for the ads comes from a $175 million package Congress gave to the department as part of Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda.

The White House has defended the ads as public service announcements akin to what past administrations have done to promote various policies. Legal experts have said the recent ads differ from many past public service announcements because they aren’t aimed at helping members of the public benefit from specific government programs.

The defendants in the lawsuit — Trump, the White House, DHS and the Office of Management and Budget — didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Fall has only just begun, but it's already time to start thinking about the quintessential winter bug: the flu.

The annual flu season usually starts in October or November. But this year, it looks like the flu started to pick up in early September.

"There are enough signs pointing in the same direction to make me think, 'OK, yes. This is the start of flu season,'" says Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

The percentage of people testing positive for the flu in the West has been rising steadily since around the beginning of September, she says. And the number of people showing up in emergency departments because of the flu has also been rising for weeks, she adds.

"It's very uncommon to see flu activity rising this early. It's activity that we might normally see more like November or December," she says.

The timing of the flu season isn't the only thing that's odd. It's also unusual that flu activity seems to have started in Western states, such as California, Washington, Hawaii and Alaska.

"It typically starts in the South and then expands from there," Rivers says. "So two uncommon developments there."

Rivers stresses that the amount of flu activity is still very low in most parts of the country. But that's starting to change as the flu picks up nationwide.

It's unclear why flu activity would have started so early, and in such an unusual part of the country. But one clue might be a new variant that evolved a mutation, which appears to make it better at evading existing immunity, especially among teenagers.

"That's our best argument for what's going on right now in terms of this early flu season," says Dr. Alex Greninger, a virologist who heads infectious disease diagnostics at the University of Washington. Doctors there are seeing as much flu right now as they usually would around Christmas, and the mutated variant appears to be common, he says.

So Greninger, Rivers and others are urging people to think about getting their flu shot earlier than usual.

"It's crucial that people get an influenza vaccine," says Scott Hensley, a virologist at the University of Pennsylvania. "And this might be a year that people might want to get a vaccine early."

But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention hasn't been promoting flu shots as it usually does. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who oversees the CDC, is a long-time vaccine skeptic.

"It is disappointing that CDC is quiet given that flu kills of hundreds of kids a year and can result in tens of thousands of hospitalizations and tens of thousands of deaths," says Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, who resigned last year as the director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to protest what he called political interference at the agency.

The CDC declined to make an official available to NPR for this story. In a statement, a CDC spokesperson said, "CDC is developing a communications strategy to provide clear, accessible information about influenza vaccination and other critical steps people can take to protect themselves during respiratory virus season. This includes information about the benefits and risks of vaccination to support informed decision-making."
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